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A couple of weeks ago there was a segment on our local news about packaged salad. This was not a recall. Consumer's Reports had an independent lab test packaged salads for contaminants. They found bacteria, specifically enterococcus and coliform, in a high percentage of the packages tested. I was using these packaged salads frequently because of the convenience. Not anymore. Here is the write up of the segment taken from Channel 27's web site:
Consumer Center - It seems like bagged salads are taking over the produce aisle. Salads straight from the bag sure are handy, and when the containers say, "fresh," "pre-washed" and "thoroughly washed," you may think the greens are squeaky clean. But how clean are they?
Consumer Reports examined more than 200 packages to find out. The salad greens were bought in the New York metro area and covered 16 brands, including Dole, Earthbound Farm Organic, and Fresh Express.
The tests were done at an outside lab and didn't find disease-causing bacteria such as E. coli, listeria, or salmonella. But they did detect other bacteria-total coliforms and enterococcus-that are indicators of poor sanitation and fecal contamination. There are no federal standards for those organisms in salads, but Consumer Reports says that there should be.
Of the 208 bags tested, there were relatively high levels of total coliforms in 39 percent of the salads, and enterococcus in 23 percent.
Most brands had at least one package with elevated levels. But even within the same brand, results varied widely.
It didn't matter whether the salads came in a clamshell or a bag. But the ones with higher levels of bacteria tended to contain spinach or be within five days of their use-by date.
Even rinsing them at home won't get rid of all the bacteria, though it will remove dirt. Your best bet is to buy the freshest produce you can. Consumer Reports found that the cleanest greens were at least six days away from their use-by date.
Stricter produce safety standards may be on the way. The Senate is considering a bill that would require the Food and Drug Administration to set standards for the types of bacteria that Consumer Reports found in its tests of bagged salad.
(Consumer Reports has no commercial relationship with any advertiser or sponsor appearing on abc27.com.)
(Copyright © 2006-2010 Consumers Union of U.S., Inc.)
Thanks for posting this Clueless
Having them prewashed in a bag is soo convenient and time-saving. I buy my spinach and mixed greens in big containers, but other lettuces just open. Its soo sad and gross that even buying more expensive brands and organic ones are still contaminated. I just wash them with water but it sounds like even that isn't enough. How do you guys wash your veggies?~shar
I just
Put mine in a strainer, and rinse for at least a couple minutes, then I put it in my Salad spinner... I haven't been buying any packaged lettuce since I started with Matia, I just get organic. But I used to use packaged spinich all the time, and never rinsed it. Sounds like a good thing I haven't been doing that of late... man what will be next : (
Clueless...
But it sounds like whether we buy packaged or not, water is not sufficient to get all the bad stuff off of it, right?! ... so it wouldn't matter which you buy?? Is that how you read your info Clueless?
(BTW -- really appreciate your sharing this important info w/ us all.... frightening to read but we must stay knowledgable on this stuff.)
(Also, BTW -- I'm very disappointed in the organic ones. I guess as far as Big Organic like Earthbound Farm their operations are so huge I shouldn't expect too much... then again I usually use a local pre-packaged salad but they're a small farm so who knows what their numbers are, if they're even tested!)
the only time i get them
the only time i get them packaged is the spinage kinda hard not to on that one. sometimes i do buy it locally fresh it's season now and I can start doing that. i eat a lot of spinage. It really doesn't take long to prepair your own lettuce. The green bags work really well. When i wash my veggies i put them in a strainer and just fluff them and then lay out some paper towels and pat them dry. Its funny i was watching good eats on kale and Alton actually says you want to put it in water submurge for about 5 min you want it deep so the sand can fall to the bottom. he puts it in a tied pillow case on fluff in the dryer i thought that was so funny. this is so he can do a lot at a time. i about cracked up lost it. But if you chop up the whole thing i like to just wash it and then tare it and put it in a green bag.
Lisa
To answer your question, it does say in the article that washing will not remove the bacteria. The weird thing was that they cited poor hygiene as the cause of the bacteria being in there in the first place. You have to wonder how this stuff is handled. I thought mostly machines did the work these days and that anyone handling anything would be wearing gloves. The article also said that the greens packaged in the hard shelled containers had the same bacteria counts. It also stated that higher levels of bacteria were found in packages that contained spinach. I know there has been problems with spinach before.I was also shocked about the Earthbound farms packaged salads having the bacteria as well. I know packaged salad is washed in a chlorine solution to sanitize it, so I can imagine some of that remains on the lettuce as well. I have been eating those packaged salads for probably 3 years now. The packaged stuff disappears off the grocery shelves like lightening. They are mostly put out on the shelves near their expiration date too, at least at our large Giant store. I sure hate giving up the convenience, but I started to buy organic head lettuce now and only tearing off what I am going to use, then washing it, and either using a salad spinner or paper towels to dry it off. It does seem to keep a lot longer in the fridge than the packaged stuff. I figure also that if the packaged salad is full of bacteria, so are the prepackaged carrots and cabbage that you can buy separately. I quit buying anything that has been cut up and prepackaged. It's hard to know what is safe to eat anymore. I guess having a properly functioning immune system is very important.
Thank you Kelsey, Nicole, & Clueless!
Thanks so much for your suggestions on how to clean the veggies. I really appreciate you all taking the time to provide an answer to my question. Its great to know that when people have questions that there is a community of people willing to share their insights. I use paper towels for drying but think it's time to get a salad spinner to speed up the process. Before treatment, I used the natural veggie cleaner sprays to kill any bacteria because I was eating more of them raw. I will definately stay away from prewashed packages as much as possible. ~shar
Prepackaged romaine hearts
I have been buying Our World prepackaged Romaine Hearts. They are not cut up. Do you think that they are contaminated as well?
Romaine Hearts
I don't know if they are suseptible to the bacteria issue or not. Since they are in a package, they might be. Anybody else have an opinion on that?
Ok, I've gotta ask... even if
Ok, I've gotta ask... even if some of these packaged salads sometimes have bacteria, doesn't their triple-wash, commercial-grade system have to be able to get way more crap off the lettuce than we ever could just rinsing w/ a regular sink at home?
Hmm Lisa
I have been wondering the same thing each time I wash my lettuce or spinach since this came up. You wonder if the packaged organic has all this crap, wouldn't the fresh stuff, even if organic have it too, or more?